1. amidst the reagan hagiogagy, krugs piece starts 'Over the course of this week we'll be hearing a lot about Ronald Reagan, much of it false.'
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/08/opinion/08KRUG.html
and greg palast: "the Rat is dead. Killer, coward, conman. Ronald Reagan, good-bye and good riddance." http://www.gregpalast.com/detail.cfm?artid=336&row=0

and while you were taken by watching arnie crying over the gipper:
2. interesting news overnight is that more 311 folk were arrested - incl of course, the mastermind 'Ahmed, known as 'Mohammed the Egyptian' ('but who was believed to be Moroccan') - we all know what i think of stories with nicknames... "Spanish authorities have linked 'Mohammed the Egyptian' to "The Tunisian", whom they consider the ringleader of the Madrid bombings."
(http://theage.com.au/articles/2004/06/09/1086460306748.html)
when the egyptian isnt planning massmurder, he works as a 'house painter' - but was "preparing other attacks when arrested, but no further details (were given)"
"Though he described suspicions about a planned attack abroad as real, "we don't have any element to say in what country or on what target".
presumably another innocent bunch of blokes being sucked into the vortex...

"the 15 arrested in his country were all foreigners, including Palestinians, Jordanians, Moroccans and Egyptians." which of course shows us that:
a) the problem is pan-national
b) the terrorists are 'amongst us'

(ill stop the madrid rant here - cos u know itll go on for ever otherwise)

torture
3. ashcroft gave a remarkable performance, contempt of congress and all that.
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/08/politics/08CND-TORT.html - ashcroft is beyond reach of course. untouchable. i hope you saw his performance. the *AG* just refused to answer questions - he didnt even invoke any privilege - everyone looked dumbfounded.
4. legal issues re torture - it seems that the administration effectively planned the whole torture thingy - must read article: http://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/08/politics/08ABUS.html - it seems torture is ok if: a) it is for a reason, or b) if inflicting pain wasnt your primary purpose. it depends what your definition of is is is.
5. blair et al have been saying that there have been 30 investigations into british torture/murder. turns out the actual # is 70+ (nb the ams/brits/oz govts are all in trouble over abug et al) - apparently the mistake was inadvertent...
http://news.scotsman.com/latest.cfm?id=3036753

oztralia
6. armitage has joined in re oz.opp.leader mark latham, following 43's outburst last week, and tom scheiffers previous efforts. armitgae is mentioned by some as being a tenet replacement, altho the official media line is that he is too close to powell in the statedept vs pentagon faux battle. (armitage is a pnac signatory)
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,9787998%255E421,00.html
7. ozzie titular head "Governor-General Michael Jeffery has come under fire for joining the debate on US President George Bush's condemnation of Labor plans to withdraw troops from Iraq by Christmas." all these people are just sposed to shutup - thats the rule. it concerns me for aforementioned reasons - it looks like we are sliding into an inevitable 'appeasement' moment come ozelection time.
http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2004/06/08/1086460294907.html?from=top5

troops
8. The Pentagon has proposed a plan to withdraw its two Army divisions from Germany and undertake an array of other changes in its European-based forces, in the most significant rearrangement of the American military around the world since the beginning of the cold war, according to American and allied officials.
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/04/politics/04MILI.html
9. on may17, the us announced a withdrawal of 3600 grunts from sthkorea - i said at the time that we can expect some more pullouts shortly - they have just announced another 12500 - just 3 weeks later (http://www.abc.net.au/ra/newstories/RANewsStories_1119812.htm) - this is significant for a couple of reasons, but lemme just point out the obvious inoculation, becuase its a technique they often use (which is why i often concentrate on 'background' news, even tho it means jumping at shadows sometimes) - it seems that they wanted to move 45% (16000/37000)of troops outta sthkorea - so first they pick a number just lower than 10% and announce the 3600 withdrawal 'less than 10%, for iraq', and they let the idea sit for a few weeks so people get used to the idea that some troops are leaving sthk, and then a few weeks later they announce 'more withdrawals' and the news doesnt sound as bad - altho the sthk govt is 'shocked', the ampublic will hardly notice cos they heard something similar a few weeks ago. and if any of you think that the ams decided to pull out the latest troop tranche in the last 3 weeks cos the last withdrawal was so terrific, then heres another $50.
10. speaking of inoculation, didja notice the pre-emptive state of emergency in georgia for g8? get used to it baby.
11. navy - ftr - there is some massive global naval exercise going on - there are some spooky types who have suggested that the idea is to get all ships away from the coastline for some reason - apparently cos waves are biggest near the shore... i dont make anything of it.

terra
12. under the reagan noise, there seems to be bombs going off everywhere in iraq and afghan - its hard to keep up with the news. the taliban just had its worst day in a year - this bit got my attention
"Among the 21 Taliban killed in the fighting, we found a Chechen with his passport," he told Reuters by telephone from the scene." - we know what i think of stories with passports, and my concerns re chech...
http://www.reuters.co.uk/newsPackageArticle.jhtml?type=worldNews&storyID=525731§ion=news
13. looks like egypt will take over much of the security for the israeli border. i dont make anything of it other than my interest in that border was piqued by that stupid camel/drugtrafficking story, which seemed to preempt the rafah warcrimes and massmurder, and now this latest curious statement about israelis outsourcing security... http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/1228834F-6D7A-4B30-877D-54E6DC6997B5.htm

media
14. rome - the protests there seemed to have 500k peeps, i think the police estimate was 250k - which is different from the reporting of 'tens of k'. two radio stations had their electricity pulled for the day.
15. condi hilite: "Asked if it was "odd" that the US was promoting democracy in the Middle East but wanted to shut down Al-Jazeera, Dr Rice said: "I don't think anybody has suggested the shutting down of Al-Jazeera. [But] . . . it would be a good thing if the reporting were accurate . . and if it were not slanted in ways that appears to be, at times . . . inaccurate."" http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/06/08/1086460297930.html